On Mon, Aug 25, 2003 at 05:43:23PM +0200, Arnoud Galactus Engelfriet wrote: > Branden Robinson wrote: > > On Sun, Aug 24, 2003 at 10:29:40PM +0100, Andrew Suffield wrote: > > > Good grief, there are jurisdictions where copyright law follows the > > > first-finder-is-keeper system used by patents? I'm not sure that free > > > software can work at all with laws like that. > > > > > > Do you have a list? I want to avoid visiting such countries.
> > I thought basically every place outside the U.S. was like that. Several > > times when the U.S. Supreme Court decision of _Feist v. Rural Telephone > > Service Co._ has come up, it's been ridiculed by some Europeans. > That talked about databases, which is a separate legal right > that has nothing to do with copyright. And yes, that was purely > a lobbyist push by database producers. > > Over in Europe, you can copyright a database of obvious facts, even if > > it isn't organized in a clever fashion. > You do not copyright a database. You claim database rights on > such a database if you can prove a substantial investment in > time, effort or money for its creation. European countries also > have trademarks, which you can get even without being creative > and original. It's a different law. Well, regardless of whether it's *called* copyright, it is a copy-right -- by virtue of the fact that it's an exclusive right granted to the creator to control the creation of copies of the work. -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer
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